Cristian Barbosu is pastor of Harvest Metanoia (Biserica Metanoia) churches in Arad and Braila, Romania. These churches partner with Harvest Bible Fellowship, a church planting arm of Harvest Bible Chapel in Rolling Meadows, IL. He is a graduate of Moody Bible Institute, Dallas Theological Seminary and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He and his wife Anne have two daughters.

English – The original notes pdf links are here and here. For the benefit of my Romanian brothers and siters I cut & pasted it here so you can use Google translate in my sidebar in order to translate these notes.

Background on Corinth
“Anybody who wanted to become a somebody especially in Corinth aspired to be trained and accepted by the Sophists.” – Bruce Winter
“The Sophists were the idols, the Hollywood stars, everyone wanted to be like them in appearance. Appearance to them was a big deal.”
The Sophists: were the wise ones. They had the look. They had the walk. They had the talk. “To handle well the art of rhetoric in the Greco Roman world was the equivalent of a PhD from Harvard or Cambridge in our world.”
“Aris or Aristas there was rivalry between these people, that‟s why there was much pride attached to being a disciple of a Sophist. Followership was the key word in the Sophist movement. Becoming a disciple of Sophists was to imitate him in every aspect of his life.

Key Scripture: 1 Corinthians 1, 2, 3 and 4 – Paul talks about wisdom.
1 Corinthians 1:10 – Paul talks about divisions, quarreling some people following Apollo, other Cephas, these were the same habits that the Sophists had.
“And now watch and see how often Paul is using the word wisdom „sophia‟. The root word for where the Sophists got their name, their pride. And see how much this word, „sophia‟ of this age is present in that Church. (vs. 19 – 25) wisdom, wisdom, wisdom, why? Because Sophism – the word dominated their minds.”
vs. 26 – 31, 1 Corinthians 2:1-6, 1 Corinthians 3:3-6, 18-21. 1 Corinthians 4:6 13
“Hit, after hit, Paul is rocking the Sophists boat.”
“Every chapter in this letter is tainted with loads and loads of culture specifics from the Corinthians context, why?

Because the world, rather than the Word, lived in the Corinthian minds, wisdom, power, talk, appearance, body, voice, no manual labor, rivalry, zealous, disciples, divisions, quarrels, persuasion, boasting, commendations, judgment, financial gain, debaters, or all of them not in the world but in the church.”
“The Corinthians were stained, wounded, burned by the world and that‟s why they were ashamed of the Word. Because you can‟t live in the world and in the Word at the same time.”
“Who is living in you? Who is driving your life the world or the Word?”

“When you have the Word in you not just the dead letter, puffed knowledge but life, the Living Word, every aspect of your life is touched by it.”
Hebrews 4: 12 – 13 – It touches everything.
Matthew 13 – What kind of fruit do you bear?
What should we do? How can we get rid of these worldly strongholds?
2 Corinthians 10:3-5 Talks about important things to destroy the strongholds.Destroy the strongholds# 1 –- Be Bold. – Expression that destroys the strongholds. “Face it directly and attack the issue… in the battle with the world you need to take the ram and attack. In other words you need to be bold, attack it.”# 2 – Trust the Word. – The knowledge of God is the Word vs. 5 – Destroy the arguments through the knowledge of God. Talks about how the Bible is seen as irrelevant, passé.
“Why don’t you trust the power of the Word of God?”
Talks about Romanian and how he worked as a custom officer right after the Romanian revolution and communism had just been overthrown. He worked with some of the older guard. They talked about stories of capturing missionaries smuggling Bibles. They had to ask 3 questions. Do you have guns, drugs and Bibles? “These officers knew that the Bible was not a simple book, it was the Word of God. They were afraid of its power and banned it out of our country.”
“This Word has power, and even their enemies know it. Do we realize it?”
“If you have the Word, you are going to change. It will change the way you dress, the things you watch, etc. What do we do when temptations come?”

# 3 – Pray. Take every thought captive and obedience to Christ –vs. 5 There is power in prayer. Take things captive to Him in prayer and fasting. “We don’t realize what power we have in prayer. We don’t realize what it means to bring every thought captive to Christ in prayer.”Conclusion:
“We are called to be in the world and not of the world.”
“We need to take a stance, be bold, trust the Word and pray.”
“Then you will say you are not ashamed of the Gospel as Paul said. The Word will change you.”
“The Word, the Living Word and not the world must live in you.”